The Power of Matching to Transform Your Life
By Kristina Turner
Our colleague and Restoring Resourcefulness Faculty member Kristina Turner shares how she learned to improvise on the piano by spontaneously matching her feelings with her fingers. Matching is a versatile skill in our Restoring Resourcefulness Program. For more transformational stories from Kristina, see the link to her podcast, Friendly Completions.
The Power of Matching to Transform Your Life
Many years ago, I had an experience of matching that astonished me and transformed my creative life.
Matching is described in the Restoring Resourcefulness Guide as using whole-body thinking and expressing to expand creativity and vitality.
When I first met Rich, he thought it was odd that after 12 years of classical piano training I couldn’t sit down to a piano and play anything without sheet music. I longed to be able to improvise but struggled to pluck out even the simplest melody on the keyboard. My tight shoulders judged myself for every wrong note.
One morning, Rich and I were sitting on the couch at a friend’s house, wondering about our next steps. We were two weeks into unsuccessfully searching for a home to rent and I felt restless. My whole body filled with pent-up energy, I started making sounds and wiggling, then exclaimed: “I feel like a dog that wants to be scratched all over!”
Rich lit up. “That’s it!” he said, pointing to the piano across the room. “Go scratch that piano like it’s that dog!”
Startled and curious, I knew Rich’s intuition was onto something. I playfully tore into those keys, standing up at first, making sheer cacophony. Every note a wrong note! What freedom! Pounding, tickling, scratching that piano dog. Laughing. Growling. Playing with my whole body, matching the intensity I felt inside.
Until magically, after several minutes, I began to hear chords and melodies emerge from my fingers at play. What??? Where was this music coming from? Amazed, I sat down and played on. Rich was smiling his Mister Richie smile.
Within a short time, we found a house. We also found a piano for $50 at a garage sale. I
scratched that piano daily until with ease I freed my ability to play any melody that comes into my head. What a life-changer!
Now, 40 years later, I’m tickling myself as I follow my impulse to mine gems from my old journals and create a podcast to share more life stories like this one.
Tune in to explore how journaling your life stories can free your body, transform your perspective on life and create your living legacy.
Listen to Episode 1 to hear how I asked Rich to marry me in 2 very unusual ways and also how I invited my play buddy Dhira to interview my perfectionist. Friendly Completions: Episode 1
Kristina Turner * https://kristinaturner.com
